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A Brief Case Study

Today I wanted to give a small example to demonstrate the effectiveness of the communication strategies I’ve discussed. My example includes my (CouponShack’s) relationship with one of our merchant partners, who we’ll call Merchant A. From February to June, 2010 our commissions averaged $165.00 per month. As of today our current commissions for Merchant A in the month of July are $335.00. An increase of a little over 100% when compared to the mean commissions for the previous five months.

From February to June, CouponShack and Merchant A’s relationship was a run-of-the-mill affiliation. They provided us with the latest (automated) content and I posted it to CouponShack accordingly. Nothin wrong with this, it’s how most business gets done in our industry. Then, at the end of June the AM for Merchant A contacted me to see what we could do to optimize our partnership. I enthusiastically obliged as I am always seeking to improve any partnership. We jumped on the phone and discussed our respective ends of the partnership as well as strategies we could utilize in order to increase sales. I won’t bore you with any details, but, in general, when I discuss optimization with AM’s they offer incentives (increased commissions, exclusive offers, etc.) in exchange for increased exposure on CouponShack (home page placement, blog, etc.), or vice versa. This is how my call with Merchant A was concluded: we increased their exposure in the efforts on my end, and they offered CouponShack commission incentives as well as a couple exclusive promotions for our users only. Thanks to our mutual efforts and optimization, sales went up and they will continue to do so.

As you can see, the generic affiliation works and will usually drive traffic leading to conversions (sales), but communication and optimization take the partnership to the next level. By discussing our options and opportunities with Merchant A, we were able to increase our commisions twofold, as well as develop a solid relationship moving forward. Imagine how much this could improve your $1,000, $5,000, or $10,000 a month partners.